Pro-Abortionists Insist Their Weakness is Their Strength

By Dave Andrusko

Thanks to the sharp-eyed, diligent readers who took the extra step yesterday. I alluded to the pro-abortion column written by Emily Bazelon, but for some reason I forgot to include a link. Readers who wanted to read the entirety of Ms. Bazelon’s argument didn’t miss a beat. They went to www.nytimes.com/2011/05/29/magazine/the-reincarnation-of-pro-life.html?_r=1 read it for themselves, and sent me comments.

Emily Bazelon

Bazelon is trying to pretend a weakness is a strength. With a more-or-less straight face she praises pro-abortion attorneys for taking on laws which Bazelon feels are easy pickings and for staying clear of laws they fear the Supreme Court might uphold—the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act”—although she neither mentions the law or concedes that pro-abortionists are petrified.

In a wholly unconvincing manner Bazelon insists—as do other defenders of that strategy—that they are NOT running away, but only choosing their cases carefully. Far from reflecting fear, we are told, it’s merely a refusal to let pro-lifers establish the ground rules. “We don’t jump when the other side says ‘Jump,’ ” in the now famous words of Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights.

This is, of course, extremely revealing nonsense, as a moment’s reflection makes clear. Bazelon’s argument is that there are pro-life laws passed this year that are really extreme.“These are precisely the kinds of cases that lawyers in support of reproductive rights should pursue, because they portray abortion foes as radical.”

But since they are avoiding it like the plague, doesn’t that suggest that maybe even Bazelon grasps that the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act” is not extreme?

Several people emailed me, beginning last night, with points I had overlooked. One said that pro-abortion attorneys are going after the low-hanging fruit (by that the writer meant laws pro-abortionists think will be easy to defeat in court).

But not only does Bazelon not mention the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, she also doesn’t even allude to laws requiring that abortion-vulnerable women be given a chance to see an ultrasound and hear a description of the child’s development to that point. Are such laws also examples of what Bazelon concedes in her final paragraph to be a “clever incremental strategy”?

But back up a step. Why would this incremental strategy work in the first place? If the public is as “pro-choice” as pro-abortion partisans insist it is, should the proposals collapse of their own weight? The reasons, as Bazelon admits, are that recent polls are “showing that more Americans now identify as ‘pro-life’” and because more legislatures are controlled by pro-life Republicans.

Other pro-abortionists don’t even bother to dress the old rationalizations in new rhetorical clothes. Julie Burkhart, the founder and director of a pro-abortion PAC, wrote an op-ed for yesterday’s San Francisco Chronicle.

So why are all these bad pro-life laws cropping up now? Well, according to Burkhart, because pro-lifers were “angry at President Obama’s agenda, including his health care reform law” and “came out in large numbers to vote in 2010.”

Why are the legislative attempts “working?” According to Burkhart, because they are sneaky.” She insists, “These legislative leaders know they can’t overturn Roe vs. Wade and so are trying to evade its force and reach by going around it. …They are slowly chipping away a woman’s right to choose…”

Really? Anybody else go that route?

We are “chipping away” at Roe in the same way pro-abortionists in the 1960s and early 70s chipped away at the protective state laws of all 50 states. The difference—the immense difference—is that we are saying LET THE PEOPLE DECIDE.

And because we believe in the power of education and are confident that the public is far closer to us than to pro-abortionists we know that given half a chance we will prevail over time.

What drives pro-abortionists crazy is that they know that is true, too.